1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a moving amount estimating apparatus that estimates a moving amount of a movable mobile body while estimating a position of a main body, a moving amount estimating method, and an autonomous mobile body including the moving amount estimating apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, an autonomous mobile body that is autonomously movable while estimating a position of a main body is known. For example, JP 2008-250906 A discloses a mobile robot that has a route sensor for detecting an ambient region where the mobile robot is movable. This mobile robot corrects a position thereof using position data present in a region within a distance of a predetermined threshold or less in point set data obtained by the route sensor.
When a position of the mobile robot is corrected by using a plurality of position data relating to this mobile robot, the position of the mobile robot cannot be accurately estimated in some cases depending on an obtained condition of the position data or the like (the position data includes noise, or a shape of an image constituted by the position data is different between before and after the movement). In this case, for example, the mobile robot might be occasionally estimated to arrive at a position that is unusual from a viewpoint of a moving speed of the mobile robot.
In a conventional mobile body such as the mobile robot, a position to be estimated by the position data has not been evaluated using moving performance of the mobile body. For this reason, in a conventional mobile body, even when a position that is unusual from a viewpoint of the moving performance of the mobile body is estimated, that position is adequate.